The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus and an information processing method. In particular, the invention relates to an information processing apparatus and an information processing method which allow a user to easily acquire information that suits his favorites through the Internet.
On the Internet, various kinds of information is provided to a user in various manners.
If a user has himself registered on what is called a mailing list that is managed by an information provider who provides a certain kind of information, he can be provided with information from the information provider by electronic mail (E-mail).
Further, distributed electronic bulletin board systems called xe2x80x9cnet newsxe2x80x9d are constructed the Internet, for example. A user can be provided with various articles by accessing what is called a net news server. In a net news system, when an article is written to a certain net news server, the article is delivered to other net news servers in a bucket-brigade-like manner. Therefore, information can be provided to many users efficiently.
Further, the WWW (world wide web) system that enables information delivery by use of a hyper text that is written in HTML (hyper text markup language) is constructed on the Internet, for instance. By utilizing the WWW system, a user can receive various information in the form of what is called home pages.
As described above, by utilizing the Internet, a user can be provided with information in various manners. However, since the amount of information is enormous, it is difficult for a user to easily acquire information that truly suits his favorites.
For example, in the case of the E-mail, since the same information is delivered to all users who are registered on a mailing list, it may include information that is useless to a certain user. Further, in the case of the E-mail, the cost of reception increases as the amount of information to be delivered increases.
With the net news system and the WWW system, a user needs to search for information that suits his favorites, which is cumbersome. Further, with the net news system and the WWW system, various information providers register new information, thus new information occurs on the Internet. A user needs to check, by accessing a net news server or a WWW server, whether new information that suits his favorites has occurred, which is also cumbersome.
The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and an object of the invention is to allow a user to easily acquire information that suits his favorites.
The invention provides an information processing apparatus connected to a network, comprising favorites information storing means for storing user favorites information that relates to favorites of a user; judging means for judging, based on the user favorites information, whether information that has newly occurred on the network is suitable for the favorites of the user; informing means for informing the user of occurrence of the information that has been judged by the judging means to be suitable for the favorites of the user; and delivering means for delivering the information to the user when a browsing request of the information is made by the user.
Further, the invention provides an information processing method in an information processing apparatus which is connected to a network and stores user favorites information that relates to favorites of a user, comprising the steps of judging, based on the user favorites information, whether information that has newly occurred on the network is suitable for the favorites of the user; informing the user of occurrence of the information that has been judged by the judging step to be suitable for the favorites of the user; and delivering the information to the user when a browsing request of the information is made by the user.